Category 4
by siobhane
Summary: Two dorks bond while stranded in the midst of a hurricane. Fluff prompt for Matrixaliesie.


The sky to the west of Balamb beach was a violent black-purple-blue, the wind a furious gale that tore shingles from roofs and battered street signs and power lines. Already, the southern end of town was without electricity and the storm was still over a hundred miles from landfall.

Zell watched from the boardwalk as the storm surge ate away at the dunes and the sea grass an inch at a time. He couldn't stay here long. The waves would soon reach the sea wall. If he stayed, he risked getting swept or blown away, and there was work to do.

He secured the hood of his heavy-duty mustard yellow rain jacket and pushed away from the rail as a gust of wind blew him off course.

It was getting bad out. If this this was the leading edge of the storm, it could be the worst in a hundred years or more.

He climbed the steps back to the street and radioed Squall to let him know the beach, boardwalk, and houses were all clear. Anyone left behind was in the process of evacuating to Garden until it was over.

"Got one that refuses to leave," Squall said. "Mind lending a hand?"

"No problem," Zell said. "Give me the address."

It wasn't far. Just a few blocks, but it took him three times as long to make the journey than it would under ordinary circumstances.

He sloshed through ankle deep puddles and ducked once or twice to avoid flying tree limbs and roof tiles and other debris. From a distance, he saw the town's only stop light tear loose and land in the middle of the street in a shower of sparks.

All along the street, the lights winked out.

There went the rest of the power.

He arrived at the address and was greeted by an elderly, sea-grizzled voice and a woman's pleading. The front door was wide open, the water nearly level with the step, and Zell knocked to announce his presence.

"I tell ya, I'm stayin'!"

"It's not safe. So let's get your things together and we'll evacuate with the others, okay?"

"It's just a little rain. I don't see what all the fussin's about."

Zell stepped further inside and discovered the pleading woman was the Library Girl.

"Zell!" she cried. "I'm so glad to see you. No matter what I say, he insists he's going to ride it out."

"Yeah, these old buzzards can be pretty hard headed," Zell said.

"...that old buzzard's my grandfather."

"Oh."

She stared like he offended her and Zell's cheeks warmed. At least the hood of his raincoat hid the blush.

"Eh, sorry," he said. "Didn't know you were a local."

"I'm not," she said. "I'm from Dollet, but he's lived here his whole life."

"I didn't know that."

"That's because I didn't tell you."

Zell's blush deepened and he shifted from one foot to the other. Outside, something cracked and crashed to the ground. Zell dashed to the window.

A tree. It's splintered branches lay scattered across the road, limbs and leaves in pieces in the ever deepening puddles. They needed to get a move on.

"Want me to carry him out?" he asked. "'Cause I can do that."

"He'll probably stab you in the kidney," she said. "He's old, but he's still mean as they come."

Zell drifted back into the front room, where the elderly man was seated in his arm chair with the foot rest propped up, a beer in one hand and a cigar in the other.

"Angie, turn the damn TV back on," the old man said. "My show's commin' on."

"The power's out, remember?" Zell said. "No power means no TV."

The old man glared at Zell with flinty, beady eyes and took a puff on his cigar.

"Who asked you, potato head?"

"Hey-"

"Be nice, Granddad," she said. "Zell's my friend."

Zell tried not to be crestfallen at being called a friend, but that was his own fault. He was too much of a chicken to ask her out on a proper date.

"All right, old man," Zell said. "The way I see it, you got two choices. You can get up and go on your own, or me and a couple SeeDs can drag you out. So which is it gonna be?"

"I. Ain't. Leavin'."

"Hey, Angie? Why don't you go pack him an overnight bag and grab whatever valuables he'll wanna take," Zell said. "I'll see if Squall can send reinforcements."

Zell wrinkled his nose at the cigar smoke and radioed Squall.

"Wind's too strong," Squall said. "Meter clocked gusts up to 80 and we've got flying debris. Think you can wait it out until there's a break?"

"We can try," Zell said, a ball of dread in his stomach.

"Secure the house as best as you can," Squall said. "Windows, doors. Find an interior room if possible, avoid the second floor in case something comes from the roof."

"Yeah, yeah, I know," Zell said. "Been through this before."

"Keep your radio on and check in periodically," Squall said. "We'll come to you as soon as we can."

"Copy that," Zell said.

He braved the rain and the brutal wind to secure the exterior window shutters and nearly blew away. It felt like giant hands tugged at him, and the rain stung like needles on his cheeks. To his left, a Stop sign blew right off its pole and became a dangerous metal disk of death as it spiraled away in the wind.

Shutters secure, he returned to the house and searched the drawers and cabinets for supplies.

"Hey old man, you got duct tape?"

"Whassit to you?"

"You got it or not?"

"Drawer in the kitchen."

He called out to Angie, who returned downstairs with a bag. She dropped it on the kitchen table as Zell explained the situation.

"So we're stuck?" she asked.

"Yep," Zell said.

Panic filled her eyes and Zell put his hands on her shoulders and gave her a light shake.

"You're a SeeD, remember?" he asked. "We got this."

"I shelve books all day. I'm intel. I don't deal with the dangerous stuff," she chanted. "We're going to die. We're going to die, Zell. Oh, gosh, I don't want to die -"

Zell cut her off with a tight hug.

"We're not going to die, okay?" he said. "We're going to get through it, and it's gonna suck, but we'll get through it, okay?"

She nodded against his chest, pulled away and sniffled.

"What do you need me to do?"

"Find flashlights and batteries," he said. "And food. We'll need snacks and drinks and stuff. Oh, and find a bucket and fill the bathtub in case the water shuts off, you know, so we can flush the toilet. I'm gonna tape up the windows in case those shutters don't hold."

The next half hour was spent in silent preparation, the only sound the howling wind and the rain and debris against the side of the house. When water began to spill in from under the front door, Zell worried the storm surge would flood the house and maybe even wash it right off the foundation.

He'd seen that before, back when he was a kid, but those were houses located just a few blocks from the beach. He hoped they were high enough above the beach the water would crest and spill down to the plain rather than continue to rise. He hoped.

When there was nothing left to do, he took Angie by the arm and led her to the stairs and seated her on the third step to wait it out.

Something hit the shutters at the kitchen window and he heard the pane crack. Wind whistled through the broken glass and his arms prickled with goosebumps.

"This is so scary," Angie said. "Stubborn old coot. This is all his fault."

"These old guys are pretty set in their ways," Zell said. "He was a fisherman, right?"

"Ship captain," she said.

"Yeah, well, the captain always goes down with the ship," Zell said.

"That's not reassuring."

"Sorry."

She sighed and laid her head against his arm and Zell's heartbeat went double-time. For a while, they listened to the wind in silence, a silence that was occasionally broken by the old man's outbursts about the noise and the dark television screen.

"Hey Zell?"

"Hmm?"

"How come you haven't asked me out yet?"

A hot blush spread out over every inch of Zell's body. Not just his cheeks but his back and arms and maybe even his feet.

"Uhh..."

"You don't... like me?" she wondered. "Because, you know, you visit the library every day and half the time, you don't even look at books, so I thought maybe... Now I'm embarrassed.. Sorry. Shouldn't have said anything."

She buried her face in her hands and groaned.

"Oh, no, hey," he said, "It's not that! I'm just, you know... Shy."

"You're not shy," she said. "You talk to everyone."

"I didn't ask 'cause I didn't want you to say no."

Her stare was incredulous.

"Rejection sucks," Zell said. "Figured it would be better to, you know, not ask and just be, you know, friends than ask and get turned down and make things all weird and awkward and stuff..."

"Oh," she said.

"And anyway, you coulda asked me," he said. "Nothing wrong with a girl asking the guy out, you know."

"Ditto the weird and awkward and stuff."

Zell laughed and dropped an arm around her shoulders, then tensed when something upstairs went smash.

"Well, if we survive this, would you go to the SeeD ball with me?" he asked. "As, you know, my date?"

"I... I already told Irvine I'd go with him."

Zell saw red. Bright, vivid, intense, murderous blood red. Irvine knew he had a crush on her, and asked her out anyway? Zell was going to choke the life right out of him the next time they crossed paths.

"Okay, wow," she said. "That was a joke."

Zell let out an explosive breath and glared.

"That was really mean!"

"Yeah, it was a lot funnier in my head," she admitted. "I didn't expect you to get all dark and stabby."

In spite of the bad joke, Zell laughed at her terminology.

"Sounded like something he'd do," Zell said. "Just to mess with me. So... um, you wanna? Go to the ball with me?"

"Of course. I've been hoping you'd ask me for weeks."

"Really?"

"What did you think all the flirting was about?!"

"You were flirting?"

She sighed and shook her head. "Guess I'm pretty bad at it, huh?"

"I must've missed it. I sometimes, you know, get so worked up, I miss social cues. Selphie says I need to work on that."

She giggled and leaned her head against his shoulder again and Zell's heart swelled. Maybe he missed the signs, maybe he spent months agonizing over whether or not to ask her out, and maybe he even beat himself up about not being worthy of her attention when there wasn't even a reason to worry.

Typical.

He decided to be brave and ask if he could hold her hand, when Squall's voice cut in on the radio.

"You guys okay?"

"Hanging in there," Zell said. "What's up?"

"We're sending a vehicle to you," he said. "Looks like the storm surge is headed your way. I'd rather risk a vehicle than risk you guys getting swept away in the flood."

"Ten-four," Zell said. "But I'm gonna need some help getting this old man to leave."

"Selphie's got a tranquilizer."

"He won't like that," Angie said.

"Too bad. Better than drowning."

Zell didn't even think about it when he reached for her hand and squeezed.

And she squeezed back.

* * *

Notes:

Fluff for matrixaliesie. This one was tough and kept getting longer and longer... fluff is hard to write. Hope you enjoyed the vanilla-flavored dork bonding! :)


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